June 10, 2014

Vintage barkcloth has always been fascinating to me. It's one of those tough, sturdy, heavy weight fabrics you can do a lot with. You can use it to make curtains, pillows, bags or even reupholster furniture pieces. The best part about this material though, is the fabulous array of vintage atomic-style designs you may come across.

Winnipeg is finally in summer mode after a crazy long winter, which means the garage sales are in full swing. You can bet I've been out already looking for some great deals and awesome vintage pieces to complete my home, and stock up the shop.

Don't worry, this all relates back to barkcloth!! I'm telling you this because this last weekend I came across the garage sale of this older gentlemen who was raising money for a nearby hospital. I looked around for a bit and saw a table with a heap of vintage barkcloth fabric on it. He came over and told me they were long curtains his wife had made before they had even met. I thought they were so awesome, so I asked him what he wanted for the set, and he said he'd give them to me for one dollar! He also wanted to throw in some vintage aprons for free, but I assured him I would at least give a donation for the hospital he was raising money for.

On I went, with my freshly dry-cleaned, fully-lined barkcloth curtains with their superb atomic print and in pristine condition no less! (...and also a couple aprons!) I was kind of in shock at what I had just found. It's hard to unearth cool things like that in Winnipeg. Let's be honest here.

So in honour of my new find, I wanted to show off some other cool barkcloth fabric that I would be more than happy to own. Some patterns are very iconic; others not so much. Each one is fantastic in it's own way, and I'd be pleased to meet some of it in person some day!